Howard Link and the Horrors of Parental Responsibility
by liketolaugh
Summary: Allen is deaged to a baby after the final battle of the Holy War, with no memory of who he once was. Link, knowing Leverrier would never let Allen live, spirits him away to raise him alone, and then realizes he has no idea what he's doing. But he's a very determined man.


**A/N: Hey! I have returned with another Tumblr-inspired oneshot series. *sheepish grin* Tired of those yet? This AU is designed by Ritequette (AO3) slash the14thscion (Tumblr).**

 **Title: Paradise in Dreams**

 **Author: liketolaugh**

 **Rating: T**

 **Pairings: None**

 **Genre: Family**

 **Warnings: None**

 **Summary: It's late, Allen won't stop crying, and Link has no idea what he's doing.**

 **Disclaimer: I only wish I owned D. Gray-man.**

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"Please stop crying," Link nearly begged, pacing back and forth, the wailing baby Allen cradled against his chest, while rain pattered against the roof and shadows swallowed the room. "Sh, sh, Allen. Don't cry, sh."

It had been only a few months since the end of the war and since Link had found Allen, a redheaded bare-armed newborn baby with only the faded scar to mark him out as Link's former charge, in the ruins.

It had been only a few months since Link had disappeared without a trace to protect him – to try and raise him right, safe and healthy and _happy,_ this time.

And, it having only been a few months, Link still had no idea what he was doing.

"You're not hungry," Link murmured, using his hoarse voice to force the thoughts through his sluggish mind, hair loose around his shoulders and threatening to fall over Allen. "I changed your diaper, you don't appear to be in pain at all-" God forbid. "-and while you might be tired, you aren't going to sleep."

He glanced down at Allen, who continued to wail, face blotchy-red and tear-stained, tiny, chubby fingers grasping at Link. Even as exhausted and frustrated as he was, his heart wrenched with dismay and anxiety.

God, he was terrible at this.

Link swallowed the apology on the tip of his tongue and looked out the window, at the rain smearing the surface and the darkness outside. Surely he'd seen people calm a crying baby before. _Sometime_ in nearly a decade of travel.

He was a highly trained warrior of the Pope, surely he could do this much.

Dammit.

Link swallowed and held Allen a little closer to himself, feeling tears soak his shirt. _Please don't cry_ was on the tip of his tongue, and _I'm sorry,_ and _I'll keep you safe, I promise._

Instead, awkwardly, he started to rock Allen, mimicking what he'd seen some mothers do. Slowing his pacing, he crossed to the window and leaned up against the wall beside it, looking down at Allen again, studying the infant face of the boy he'd grown to know so well.

He couldn't mess this up. He wouldn't.

Desperately, he scraped through his memories for anything useful, anything at all – anything that wasn't dust and death and war, but soft faces and children's laughter. Scraped knees and bruises, not broken bones or empty stomachs or the oppressive cold of a winter outside.

And then, in a flash, he came upon not a memory, but a tune- A lullaby. He couldn't remember where he'd heard it, couldn't even remember all the words, but even he knew what a lullaby was for.

"Guten Abend, gut' Nacht, mit Rosen bedacht-"

His voice was rough and halting, the tune faltering and hesitant and the words dissolving into hums where his memory failed him. But he kept at it, and slowly, Allen's wails quieted into sobs, then whines and whimpers, and finally hiccups, the boy's head lolling against Link's arm in exhaustion.

"Morgen früh, wenn Gott will-"

Link paused to sigh in relief, and then, taking the lullaby back up, sat down on his bed. He shifted his grip slightly to run his thumb over Allen's cheek, and Allen reached up to grab his hand and pull his thumb into his mouth, silver eyes glimmering up at Link tiredly as he suckled on it.

"Schau im Traum's Paradies."

Link gave him a faint smile, finally letting the song trail into silence, and sure enough, Allen remained quiet, fingers still clinging lightly to Link's and mouth latched to the tip of his thumb.

Link let him, his mind drifting. It had been impulse that had first led him to take Allen away; Leverrier would never have let Allen survive, not after everything, but Allen was a _child_ now, an _infant._ And Link had very much wanted to look after him in a way that he had never managed to do during the war. (Healing him wasn't the same as keeping him from being hurt at all, to say nothing of before even that, when Link had betrayed him in perhaps the worst way possible.)

Now, after months of late nights and mistakes and _trying,_ that mess of guilt and fear and protectiveness had melted together into something different and foreign, something Link was reluctant to name.

Allen was a cute baby, it turned out. He giggled and smiled and reached out to strangers, he clung to Link and babbled and wasn't picky with his food even though he was extremely fussy about sleep.

He also cried, Link suspected, even more than most babies did, which really shouldn't have surprised Link at all, given Allen's tendencies as a teen.

And he deserved _better_ than he'd gotten, last time around.

Link closed his eyes and, for a moment, just held onto Allen, feeling the weight of the responsibility he'd undertaken. There were so much that could go wrong, so many things that could happen- Allen felt so fragile, right now. Nothing like when he had been a newborn, of course, when Link had near refused to put him down at all, but that was saying very little.

"Alright, Walker," he said at last, prying his eyes open. _Wait, dammit-_ "Allen. If you're quite alright now, I'll put you down to sleep. Tomorrow morning we'll wake up, and I'll take you out so we can buy groceries again, and then perhaps if you're very good we can have a walk around town. Does that all sound fine?" He waited, as if Allen had any means of objecting, and immediately felt rather silly. "Good. Then goodnight, Allen, and sweet dreams."

Carefully, he stood up again, keeping Allen as steady as he could, and crossed to the crib. He set Allen down, extracted his thumb, and filled Allen's grasping hands with the soft blanket he'd first purchased to wrap Allen in. He tucked him in, stepped back to survey his handiwork, and smiled faintly.

They'd gotten through another day.

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 **There we go! *bounce* Very brief, very concise explanation of the AU, but I hope it's enough - if it's not and you want a little more next chapter, let me know, please. Thanks for reading, and please review!**


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